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Topic: More Dell issues (Read 2596 times)

So my desktop is acting up, keeps shutting down and rebooting for no reason. Yesterday I spent an hour with dell tech support instant chat, all I wanted was to set up a service visit (covered by the warrenty) but no they have to go through the steps.They had me reinstall the factory settings, then as that would take a while they would call me back today.The fix did not work, I missed the callback (went straight to voicemail ?) so tonight I get back on to tech support, they wanted me to go through a whole bunch of steps, including removing the CD drive and the hard drive, at that point I lost my internet connection and was booted from chat before I could get back on, I now have competer parts sitting on the table, was number 17 in que, down to number 3.

Total time wasted so far, about 4 hours. I am also not convinced the chat guys are not bots.

Sounds like it is time to snd your PC out to DELL for repair OR pay the big bucks for a tech to bring his stuff with him and work on your drives. No one wants anyone to have access to their C DRIVE no one - but sometimes you need a tech to NOT be able to fix it to get a new one!

I keep a SD MEMORY CARD in my Wallet, everything is encryted with my wife knowing the password. Only MEDICAL INFORMATION ABOUT ME is available unencrytped:

You want a policeman, doctor, hospital, whomever finds your dead or dying body and they find out you have a series of letters explaining your wishes for organ usage in case of brain trama. I want to give everything I can and the cremate me.

But your MEMORY CARD SHOULD INCLUDE:

Your name, address, phone numberPeople to contactA list of all your doctors and their numbersA full list of your medication, many you MUST TAKE every so many hours and cannot sit in an emergency room for 12 hours and 3 more hours before seeing a doctor.List prescriptions according to which doctor subscribes them.

MOST IMPORTANTLY - a PATIENT HISTORY REPORTCreate a document timelining all surgeries, medication changes, diagnosis, EVERY MEDICAL CONTIDITION you either have now, had then and a list of current x-rays, MRIS, CTscans - is your doctor currently looking to find a specialist to help you with something - that is important to share.

Have your Social Security Card NumberAll your different medical insurance numbersHave your employer's phone number and person of contact listed.Have a list of all your doctors and why you see them.

Have a goodbye letter to EACH of your FAMILY ENCRIPTED - IF YOU DIE, they will have your last letters written by you to them.

The Chip also includes what will happen with Beemaster Forums, there will be a curtious and Grandiose transistion of power at the time of my demise (and not a minute before - lol)

But I keep this chip in my walet - if given perission from Tracey they can use the pass word IF need be - but that is not the case, only she can see what is encrypted - everything medical, contact info, blood type, diabetes or seizures? What ever you suffer should be right there. The all info can be protected, give your spouce 2 passwords, the first they give is to medical info, the second account related stuff. Wills, contracts, docs to be handled. EVERYTHING on a $9.99 or cheaper 64meg smart media - or other chips, have all your on that card, you may save your life. Wear it around your neck if you have to.

We are only a generation from seeing the baby boomers dying off at an incredible rate. Not many WW1 vets left now, We'll still have the GREATEST GENERATION of WW2 vets. all our great Viet Nam Vets, Korean and the Iraqie war going on since what 1991. to all of you thank you.

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Ahhh, sounds like you have one of two or three things, first there is either spyware, notorious for shutdowns, second an overheating issue, you should get a warning, but not always. second , windows is corrupt, and the kernel reboots, does it do an NT/Authority Shutdown? or just gone, if its just gone that could be the kernel reboot. You can repair windows, either reinstall , roll back, (not really a fix cause the problem could be way back. You should go to the administration section in your windows and look at athe event log, it should say why or give some shutdown errors. that will lead you to the problem cause. The guy on the phone is just reading out of a book, he has no idea what or hw to fix anything. Ask him to transfer you to the second lvl support, he'll fight you but push for it, or demand a service call. The first thing they will do is replace the motherboard, and/or check your memory. I would reccomend that you remove all but one memory stick from the system and see if that helps, if not change that memory for the other stick, assuming you have more than one, memory can do that as well. In a few changes you should find the bad stick if that is the problem, if it isn't that they will replace the sytem board, but on your end you should run an updated virus scan, and a spyware cleaner as well, I reccomend either spybot or adaware, both are free. delete all that they find, that you can do at home. See if they will send a tech, yes its a pita, but he will come with memory(should) a motherboard, powersupply, thats all it could be, now again in your bios, (usually the delete key) you can sometimes see a run DMT test you can run that and test the hardrive. But again if you are warranty play the game let them help you. Its what you pay for when you purchase there computer. There is more you can do at your end, go to start/run/ cmd when your black screen comes up type in after the c: prompt "sfc /scannow" don't use the quotes, it might ask for your windows cd. if so put in the cd drive and hold the shift key so it won't start.Then let SFC/scannow run it won't hurt anything, if there are windows errors it should fix them, and you won't loose data. Second thing, when above is done, you may have to reboot, so after that go back into the cmd, window, this time type in chkdsk /r this will probly tell you it wont lock the drive becuse its in use, or ask you to force a dsimount, you can say yes, but it probly won't do it, but it will ask you if you want to do it on the next reboot , say yes and reboot. again it will inspect the drive for errors, repairing if possible, it will also check the system files again from a different view. Those are a few things you can try on your own, If you have any questions feel free to ask. And if your really desperate pm me. we can work over the phone or chat.

MSCE/MSP/A+/Net+Support is my world.

John,

If he is in chat with Dell he most likely has a warranty? That should include a tech on site to repair it. If you ask for help you can't tie the hands of the guy thats gonna do it. They won't give you a free one just because a user won't let the guy access the computer. I suppose the laying of the hands could work, but only if you have faith! Every tech in our org. is security cleared, background checked, if you can't trust the computer tech, you aren't going to get a working computer for long. Dell, like all computer company's has to have there techs backgrounds checked. I personally get a LIEN check every 6 months, and updated background checks, yearly. If you have stuff on your C: drive that you are afraid of people seeing, it's your own fault if you loose it, you can be hacked so easily its almost a joke. The only reason you don't get hacked is that you don't have what they want, that and the sheer numbers of computers on the internet. Like I posted here yesterday, the worlds largest credit card company/debit cards was hacked. They have in my opinion a relative high security system in place. And its hacked yearly, 2008 being the largest in history. Backup your stuff, keep it on a separate hardrive and disconnect it from the system unless your doing an upgrade or back up. That keeps the system secure and you don't have to worry about someone going thru your personal stuff. It also allows the tech guy to fix your system without you worrying about his looking thru your system, Which techs really don't care whats there, we see it all, its hard to surprise the techguy.

« Last Edit: January 25, 2009, 11:50:44 AM by MustbeeNuts »

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Each new day brings decisions, these are new branches on the tree of life.

Thanks, so far so good.After I removed the hard drive while waiting to get back in touch with support I gave the inside a good cleaning. The power supply internal vents were almost completely blocked with dust (personally I always suspected overheating).Support had me do a couple of things and then put the hard drive back.Since then the computer appears to be working fine, they will be doing a callback later today to see if it is still running ok.They claim the hard drive was not seated correctly, not sure I buy that one but as long as the computer continues to work they can claim whatever they want.

As for security, I have nothing of importance on the actual hard drive, I keep everything on a 500GB portable drive that has some pretty serious encryption.I also do weekly scans for everything, I have been doing this since about four years ago when I kept telling the wife she had to be more carefull about what she opened, she was complaining about the computer being very slow so I ran a scan which at the time I had never done before, the scan found over 300 viruses, spyware etc. Took me almost 3 days to clean up.

You are a refreshing change for me, usually I get folks that never back up, have none or expired Virus protection, it also sounds like your doing all the correct things, good for you. Really a refreshing change. thats the way it should be done. Hats off to you. Again tho, if you do get into a jam, feel free to contact me I'll do my best to help or advise you.I do support Dell as well. in fact there aren't any that I don't have certifications for, but I am not the guy on the phone, I'm the one they send to you. :mrgreen:

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Each new day brings decisions, these are new branches on the tree of life.

thanks for the offer mustbee'Well the computer lasted about 24 hours then started doing its shutdow thing again. About the only way I can get it to start up is to unplug the power supply, the longer it stays unplugged then the longer the computer appears to run ?

I use to travel all over Indiana and Ohio to repair HPs, Compaqs, Sony, and some Dells for the in home warranties.

Besides the issues listed above. First get a voltmeter and test your outlet. You can purchase a PC, bring it home and plug it in to an outlet and it work fine for a couple years or more, but them as it ages they can become sinsitive to outlets that don't have the correct voltage, or have to much fluxuation.

Use a voltmeter to check the outlet's voltage before replacing or removing any parts. Just in case you don't know how, place the red probe in the left terminal, and the black probe in the right, you should see 105-120v (will usually fluxuate). Now remove the black probe and place it in the ground (the middle) terminal, your reading should be about the same. BTW...the hot terminal can be on the right if the outlet is upside down.

I've seen outlets have as low as 40v and outlets that would suddenly lose power for a second or more.

thanks for the offer mustbee'Well the computer lasted about 24 hours then started doing its shutdow thing again. About the only way I can get it to start up is to unplug the power supply, the longer it stays unplugged then the longer the computer appears to run ?

Try to boot in safe mode and see wht it does, if it dont shutdown, then you know its windows, if so then try what I said above.I think I would bet powersupply since your unplugging and getting bootup, then that points to a faulty power supply. Not totally mind you but I would hedge my bet there first.

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Each new day brings decisions, these are new branches on the tree of life.

Dell service tech came out today to replace whatever parts needed to be replaced (mother board and power supply for sure) guess he will be back as when he removed the processor chip from the old board to put in the new one some of the pins broke off, one day my desktop will be up and running but not today.